Cementing radioactive waste could save U.S. billions

Since 2002, the U.S. Deptartment of Energy has funded construction of a $17 billion project to encase radioactive wastes in solid glass logs. It is scheduled to start operations in 2022 and treat more than 56 million gallons of hazardous liquids which are stored in tanks on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation.

It is called vitrification, a process by which the state of Washington and federal government agreed in 1989. It is complicated, time consuming and very costly.

To speed up treatment and reduce costs, the federal government is testing a procedure at Hanford to harden the wastes with a concre...